Christian Holmberg Sjöling

About

I am a final year PhD student at Luleå University of Technology in Sweden set to defend my dissertation “Using computational and quantitative linguistic methods to inform language assessment and learning” in December 2026.

My research is centred around learner corpus linguistics, with a particular focus on describing written learner language in English (mostly L2 but also L1) in relation to different educational contexts and situations. As such, I analyse a variety of linguistic constructs (e.g., lexical and grammatical complexity, accuracy, cohesion) in, for example, high-stakes exams, cross-sectional/longitudinal corpora, and mixed-methods designs.

I use an array of advanced statistical methods and computational tools in my research but am also a proponent of minimally sufficient methods to maintain linguistic interpretability – an explicit aim of my research is for it to be useful for teachers, test constructors, and curriculum designers. To complement my interest in learner language, I also work with research methodology by, for example, developing computational measures of different linguistic constructs and examining research methodology in the study of English learner language in the Swedish context.

Contact: christian.holmberg.sjoling@ltu.se

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Portrait of Christian Holmberg Sjöling

Published journal articles

  1. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2026). The relation between linguistic accuracy and scoring of Swedish EFL students’ writing during a high-stakes exam. Assessing Writing, 67, 100995. DOI
  2. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). The effect of lexical complexity on grading of Swedish EFL learners’ texts during high-stakes exams. International Journal of Learner Corpus Research, (2), 245–275. DOI
  3. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2023). A longitudinal study of Swedish upper secondary school students’ vocabulary development. Nordic Journal of English Studies, (3), 59–80. DOI

Journal articles under review

  1. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (under review). The relation between grammatical complexity and grading of Swedish EFL students’ texts during a high-stakes exam. Journal of Second Language Writing.

Journal articles in preparation

  1. Holmberg Sjöling, C. The relation between cohesion and grading of Swedish EFL students’ texts during a high-stakes exam.
  2. Holmberg Sjöling, C. The relation between linguistic complexity, cohesion, and accuracy and scoring during a Swedish high-stakes EFL exam.
  3. Holmberg Sjöling, C. & Kim, T. Introducing an index for analysis of grammatical diversity in writing.
  4. Holmberg Sjöling, C., Caines, A., Andersen, Ø., & Buttery, P. What are the relationships between linguistic dimensions and scoring carried out by out-of-the-box large language models?
  5. Holmberg Sjöling, C., Caines, A., Andersen, Ø., & Buttery, P. Analysing to what extent theoretically fine-tuned large language models can analytically/holistically score learner writing across and within CEFR levels.
  6. Holmberg Sjöling, C., Caines, A., Andersen, Ø., & Buttery, P. Can theoretically fine-tuned large language models increase the linguistic validity of scoring carried out by assessors/teachers?
  7. Reppen, R., Kim, T., & Holmberg Sjöling, C. Writing trajectories of grammatical complexity in L1 children’s writing.
  8. Jong, M., Holmberg Sjöling, C., Hanstock, H., McGawley, K., & Jong, M. Translation and validation of the Nature Relatedness scale into Swedish.
  9. Holmberg Sjöling, C. Towards a best practice for solo and manual error annotation.
  10. Holmberg Sjöling, C. An overview of research methodologies in studies of learner English in Sweden between 2005–2025.

Books in preparation

  1. Holmberg Sjöling, C. Evaluating computational measures in learner corpus research.

Doctoral dissertation

  1. Holmberg Sjöling, C. Using computational and quantitative linguistic methods to inform language assessment and learning.

Peer-reviewed conference presentations

  1. Holmberg Sjöling, C. & Kim, T. (2026, forthcoming). Expanding the construct of grammatical complexity: A case for grammatical diversity in writing. At ICAME47, 26–30 May, University of Koblenz, Germany. [oral presentation; full paper]
  2. Holmberg Sjöling, C. & Kim, T. (2026, forthcoming). Expanding the construct of grammatical complexity: A case for grammatical diversity in writing. At ASLA, Swedish Association of Applied Linguistics Symposium, 7–8 May, Umeå University, Sweden. [oral presentation; full paper]
  3. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2026, forthcoming). The effect of linguistic complexity, cohesion, and accuracy on grade in the national tests of English. At ASLA, Swedish Association of Applied Linguistics Symposium, 7–8 May, Umeå University, Sweden. [oral presentation; full paper]
  4. Holmberg Sjöling, C. & Kim, T. (2026, forthcoming). Expanding the construct of grammatical complexity: A case for grammatical diversity in writing. At the American Association for Corpus Linguistics (AACL) 2026, 18–19 April, University of Florida, USA. [oral presentation; full paper]
  5. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). The influence of grammatical complexity features on grade in Swedish high-stakes EFL exams. At the Learner Corpus Research Graduate Conference 2025, 22–24 October, Chemnitz University of Technology, Germany. [oral presentation; full paper] [online]
  6. Holmberg Sjöling, C. & Kim, T. (2025). Introducing an index for analysis of grammatical diversity in writing. At the Learner Corpus Research Graduate Conference 2025, 22–24 October, Chemnitz University of Technology, Germany. [oral presentation; full paper] [online]
  7. Holmberg Sjöling, C. & Kim, T. (2025). Expanding the construct of grammatical complexity: A case for grammatical diversity in writing. At Second Language Research Forum, Northern Arizona University, September 25–28, USA. [oral presentation at roundtable]
  8. Holmberg Sjöling, C., & Kim, T. (2025). Writing trajectories of grammatical complexity in L1 children’s writing. At ICAME46, 17–21 June 2025, Vilnius University, Lithuania. [oral presentation; full paper]
  9. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). The effect of accuracy on grading of Swedish EFL students’ writing during high-stakes exams. At National Forum for English Studies, 9–11 April 2025, Lund University, Sweden. [oral presentation; full paper]
  10. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2024). The effect of noun phrase complexity on the grading of EFL students’ texts. At The American Association for Applied Linguistics, 16–19 March 2024, Houston, USA. [oral presentation; full paper]
  11. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2023). Using lexical complexity measures to predict grades in student writing. At The Graduate Student Conference in Learner Corpus Research, 25–27 October 2023, Eurac Research, Italy. [oral presentation] [online; full paper]
  12. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2023). Lexical complexity and assessment of EFL writing: a study of the assessment of English vocabulary in the Swedish national tests. At EuroSLA32, August 30–September 2, University of Birmingham, UK. [oral presentation; full paper]
  13. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2023). Using grammatical and syntactic complexity measures to predict grades in student writing. At National Forum for English Studies, 26–28 April 2023, Mälardalen University, Sweden. [oral presentation; full paper]
  14. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2023). Using lexical complexity measures to predict grades in student writing. At National Forum for English Studies, 26–28 April 2023, Mälardalen University, Sweden. [oral presentation; full paper]
  15. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2021). A longitudinal study of Swedish upper secondary school students’ vocabulary development. At The Graduate Student Conference in Learner Corpus Research, 11–12 October 2021, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, Norway. [oral presentation; full paper] [online]

Invited talks

  1. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). Can we use quantitative linguistic methods to inform language teaching and learning? Hosted by the Automated Language Teaching and Assessment group at the University of Cambridge, UK.
  2. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). The effect of accuracy on grading of Swedish EFL students’ writing during high-stakes exams. At the Centre for English Corpus Linguistics in Louvaine-la-Neuve, Belgium.
  3. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). Can we use quantitative linguistic methods to inform language teaching and learning? Visiting scholar guest lecture hosted by the Department of English and the Department of Education at Northern Arizona University, USA.
  4. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2024). The relation between linguistic complexity and grading during high-stakes EFL exams. At the Language Didactics seminar, Department of Education and Special Education, Gothenburg University, Sweden.
  5. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2023). The effect of accuracy on grading of texts written by EFL students. Higher seminar of English Linguistics at Uppsala University, Sweden.
  6. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2022). Lexical richness and assessment of EFL writing: a study of the assessment of English vocabulary in the Swedish national tests. Higher seminar of English Linguistics at Uppsala University, Sweden.
  7. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2022). Presentation of PhD project plan. Higher seminar of English Linguistics at Mid Sweden University, Sweden.
  8. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2022). Presentation of PhD project plan. Higher seminar of English Linguistics at Uppsala University, Sweden.

Local talks

  1. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). Introducing an index for analysis of grammatical diversity in writing. At the higher seminar of Language, Literature and Education, Luleå University of Technology.
  2. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). A critical perspective on the inclusion of artificial “intelligence” in higher education. At the departmental day of Education and Languages, Luleå University of Technology.
  3. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2025). Hur påverkar språket betygsättning under nationella proven i engelska? Utbildningsdialog i Norr (UDiN), Luleå.
  4. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2024). The effect of grammatical complexity on grading of Swedish EFL learners’ texts in a high-stakes exam. European Day of Languages at Luleå University of Technology 2024.
  5. Holmberg Sjöling, C. (2022). Using vocabulary notebooks in EFL teaching. European Day of Languages at Luleå University of Technology 2022.

Member of editorial board

  1. Nordic Journal of English Studies (2025–)

Peer reviewer of journal articles

  1. International Journal of Learner Corpus Research
  2. Nordic Journal of English Studies

Peer reviewer of conference abstracts

  1. Second Language Research Forum (2025). Elevating Perspectives: Reaching New Heights in L2 Research. Northern Arizona University, September 25–28, USA.

Roles as student/PhD student representative

  1. Doctoral representative in an evaluation of KTH Royal Institute of Technology conducted by the Swedish Higher Education Authority (Spring 2026–Spring 2027).
  2. Election committee member of the PhD Students Association (2024–2025, 2025–2026).
  3. Doctoral representative on the university board (2022–2023, 2023–2024), Luleå University of Technology.
  4. Chair of the PhD Students Association (2022–2023, 2023–2024), Luleå University of Technology. [each term was 20% of my employment]
  5. Student representative in Treklövern’s evaluation of Mid Sweden University, Karlstad University, and Linnæus University (2019).
  6. Student representative on the council for teacher work placement (VFU) (autumn 2018–2020), Mid Sweden University.
  7. Student representative on the council for Swedish Literature (2018–2021), Mid Sweden University.
  8. Student representative on the council for Swedish Linguistics (2018–2020), Mid Sweden University.
  9. Student representative on the council for teacher education (2016–2020), Mid Sweden University.